Tag: smoke

Zen and the art of Culinary Maintenance by JT Hilltop

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Centerlawn, 1971
Centerlawn. That’s where I grew up, in my parents suburban dream just east of the Gold Coast Great Gatsby section of Long Island. In the backdrop of this little utopia was a huge cauldron of a media inspired sizzling hot generation gap. A war in Viet Nam, a disregard for civil rights, women’s rights, and youth rights, added to the police brutality all over the country had boiled to the top and threatened to spill over into the kitchens all across Centerlawn pitting sons against fathers and daughters against mothers. It was no wonder all we ever cared about was getting high. My brother was in the army likely headed for Nam soon and if things continue the way they are my entire neighborhood would be in Viet Nam in two years. Being in high school sucked, but it sure was better than dodging bullets and bombs. Anyway, time for some old fashioned get high so let the search begin.

Chapter II The Dream Is Born

A typically boring day in high school where cutting class was a necessary event to keep from dying of boredom. Some of us made it an art form which most often was accompanied with a search for a little buz or someone to share yours with. Three years ago pot smokers were a small group but now the non pot smokers are a small group and most of them were considered “narcs”. So much pot was smoked daily in school that we sometimes wondered if that was how it earned the term “high” school. We knew that was just a joke of course but the amount of marijuana exchanged in the hallways was really was substantial. My particular clan of cronies had earned a reputation for being some of the most prolific pot puffers. I could smoke a huge doobie all by myself and still be able to go to any class and function. At least I thought I was. Any class except maybe gym anyway. Yea the “jocks” Those boneheaded sports enthusiast loved to pick on longhairs. They talked in what I assume was the Cro-Magnon vernacular saying well thought out repetitive jokes like “Hey, is that a girl in our gym class? Hey girlie, the girls gym is next door.” So many times I wanted to say something like “Oh I know, I share a locker with your girlfriend”, but I am much too nice a guy. Then again maybe it was because they would have kicked my ass with their Charles Atlas biceps. Not wanting to get sand kicked in my eyes I opted for keeping it an inside joke. They really would kick my ass if they ever found out I had sold and smoked pot with many of their girlfriends at one time or another.
Anyway, whenever I got bored, which usually only happened on school days I engaged in a ritual tradition that Ken and the rest of my band of merry marauders enjoyed called “Find some Buzz”. We would go in search of anyone that had a joint, or a chunk of hash, and ask them to front us a hit. More often than not when a good friend came by they would ask us if we wanted some buzz before we even asked because we always shared our stash, no one really liked to smoke alone. It wasn’t unusual for Ken and I to run into each other in the hallways because we had a certain few places we always hung out at that were prime hiding spots while cutting class. Today would be no different. My best friends voice startled me, “Hey dude, I have a fucking brilliant idea.” Ken was the idea man and had tons of them. “And we should start saving money for it right now.” As always, Ken immediately garnered my curiosity having blown me away with truly great ideas so often. Ken was brilliant and creative. Many of the other students laughed at him back in Jr. high, because when he moved here from Oklahoma he was the first boy in school to have really long hair. All of five foot six, he had long flowing blond hair that was parted in the middle cascading over his shoulders and half way down his back. He had a rebel soul and I was drawn to him instantly. Like most of the male students I had started growing my hair long in part to look cool, but more importantly to piss off my Mom and Dad. Most all of us had developed a twitch from keeping our long bangs out of our eyes. We all wanted to be Beatle “moptops”back then but Ken was ahead of the curve and had already grown his hair long like……well like a girl. That was also part of Kens appeal. He seemed to know ahead of everyone else what would be in style before it actually came in style. He had gone from a long haired geek freak that was made fun of to a well respected member of the hippie rebellion ranks. Proudly I admit I had much to do with his rise to “coolness” because for some weird reason I was always allowed to hang with the cool kids since fourth grade. It wasn’t that I actually was cool, but I had an older brother and even older sister who had created reputations with the teachers. Those reputations preceded me so you could say I was cool by association. I played kid rules football and baseball with the “older” kids , got rides in my sisters boyfriends “Surf Woody”, and just always hung out with the older kids. So my becoming Kens friend had helped him gain acceptance and move up the hipster social ranks quickly with my friends. It wasn’t long until they too saw how insightful he was to popular culture and trends. Before the end of the 9th grade we were all growing our hair long, and wearing cool clothes like bell bottom pants and double breasted balloon sleeve shirts. Checks, stripes, paisley prints, the brighter the better and no worries if it doesn’t match. Now we all had real long hair, afro’s, long straight hair, super curly locks or like mine long wavy banana curls.
But the first order of business was to relieve the boredom with a little herbal remedy. “Cool dude, but lets go out to La Bomba and do a bowl first. You still got that hash?” As usual Ken came through. “Of course bro, some nice opium streaked black Afghanistan. Lets go asshole.” I hated his “lets go asshole” phrase but he always sang it like a commercial jingle and everyone laughed, so I just dealt with it. Off we went to the parking lot to climb into my car to smoke some hash. My little red Simca, A French sedan type car that was Frances answer to the Volkswagen, “La Bomba” is what we called the car and it was our entire groups pot smoking haven. I never locked the doors because so many of my friends used it at various times of the day, even if I wasn’t there. But this day, at this moment, no one else was around. I could tell Ken was happy about that because he really wanted to talk about his idea. Tell you the truth, I was pretty anxious as well. As he filled his chamber pipe with a small piece of black hash I needed to know. “So Ken, what’s this new idea?” Not a ground breaking or earth shattering question but it‘s hard to talk while smoking hashish. “ Well, here’s the thing.” I heard the match strike and light up as he put the pipe to his lips and lit the hash. He spoke as he was inhaling and his voice got lower and stranger as he talked as if gasping for a last breath but had to get a statement out. The interior of my little red bomba filled up with the sweet herbal haze of hash smoke. In between inhaling and holding the smoke Ken laid out his plan. We would be graduating in two year’s and with no job or plan for college Ken was open for an adventure. I did have a job but at the time I thought it was just a job not a career. I was up for adventure too and most likely not attending college either. The choice was basically go to college, get drafted, or leave the country. I was smart enough for college but my grades had fallen substantially over the last two and a half years. I stopped putting in any effort after my Dad called me a worthless communist because I did a project about the dreaded USSR and the positive side of Socialism. I took the point of view that they had some redeeming values. Controversial but worthy of an A+ from my liberal social studies teacher. Instead of being proud he freaked on me. What an asshole! Anyway our fates will be in the hands of our government considering we would more than likely be shipped off to Viet Nam. Ken thought we could save up some cash, get a video camera and supplies, and head out to Chicago. “Jesus shit man, we can burn our draft cards and just get the fuck out of town.” His idea was to start at one end of Rt. 66 and travel to the other end to Santa Monica where we could settle in with the hippies of California. “You know man that’s a great fucking idea, we can be like those two guys on Rt 66, I’ll be Buzz and you can be Todd.” Ken gave me a punch, “No fucking way man, I’m Buzz, you’re more the Todd type. If either of them dudes were around today Buzz would definitely be in a band. Todd would have a silver pen!” Ken had a love of guitar and film and I wanted to write. His idea was to basically make a kind of documentary of the trip, Ken with his camera and me with my pen. “Bro, you can write the whole thing down in your notebook.” Yea, my notebook, JT’s bible. I took my notebook almost everywhere convinced I was the next James Michner, Jack Kerouac, or maybe even Ken Kesey who wrote about the life of the Merry Pranksters. My book was full of poems, short stories, or just a few of my abstract observationsand Ken’s idea blew me away. To me it was brilliant, the chance of a lifetime. RT 66 was so historic, a television show, the route for all the dust bowlers of the 1930’s who fled to California to escape poverty. Route 66 was the sort of scenic route people took who just wanted to migrate to Los Angeles. I mean Jesus shit, the fucking stones do a tune about it. Brilliant choice, from Chicago to Los Angeles via Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Texas, and Arizona. Ken shot me his infamous shit eating grin and said, “whatcha think, lets go asshole.” I was sold instantly.
TBC

 

Rear View Paranoid

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REAR-VIEW

I thought my life was flashing before my eyes as paranoia began creating a vortex for its ascent from my stomach up into my head. Fear shot electronic impulses through my entire body as the flashing continued. Get hold of yourself dude, everythings cool!! Its an actual flashing not my life flashing. A quick peek in the rear view mirror reveals there is a cop car advertising its intentions behind me in my car. The cop car drove past me in pursuit of another driver. My adrenal glands began chuckling as the paranoia flew out the window into the cosmos. Those flashing lights weren’t for me at all. The welcome relief washed over me but the tension remained. WTF? At this point of my life I am an upstanding law abiding citizen. Well aside from whatever I may do in the privacy of my own home but that’s my business. My car is legal, I drive and obey the traffic laws, (like never speed when a cop is near by, etc.) so I have no reason to fear even if I do get pulled over. I no longer keep any stashes under my seat or papers in the console. Hell man, I even had my seatbelt on. So why this rush of paranoia every time a cop is behind me when I drive? Primal evolutionary instinct? Not exactly but it can be traced back to my teen years.
Like most of the derelict suburban youths of my era my first contact with police outside of school visits, or watching Dick Tracy and Courageous cat and Minute Mouse, was our own teenage version of cat and mouse with the cops. We wanted to get drunk drinking cheap beer or wine and they wanted to catch us and sadistically pour it out while sarcastically letting us know we should head home to Mommy and Daddy. In truth it was an okay relationship for both parties, they could tell the adults in town that the streets were free of drunken degenerate teen hoodlums and we only had to cry over spilled beer, not get in big trouble with Mom and Dad. But it all changed when the evil Satan Smoke, Beelzebub bud, the Devils Weed crept its vile horned joint rolled self into our teen culture. The sinister antichrist herbal delight swept into our teen lungs, relieving our teen angst, making us teen laugh, giving us teen munchies, and made us feel all around teen fucking awesome.
Unfortunately the post teen portion of suburbia was not as enchanted with wacky weed as we were, they were certain it would turn each and every one of us into drug addicted serial killers who threaten to tear and shred the very fabric of their three martini society to shreds. Our relationship with the police altered drastically at this point. The police needed to massage the concerns of the scotch swilling adults assuring them no marijuana could find its way into their neighborhoods but we wanted to massage our minds with that very same illegal weed of wit and wisdom. Now our job as teens was to smoke pot and get high free of handcuffs and the cops hoped to arrest us and lock us up so the rest of society could rest easy knowing the refer mad hooligans were locked up alongside murderers, rapers, and armed robbers. Where we belonged. (is there a special font for sarcasm?) Then and only then could society relax and take a deep breath. Not a breath test, because I’m pretty certain most of our parents would register above the limit for alcohol. Anyway, the dichotomy changed, we found better hiding spots and continued our evil ways and cops continued in fruitless pursuit of passionate pot puffing juvenile perps.
Once we began driving however, the cops had the advantage. With badge comes privilege and the police were willing and able to take liberties in their attempts to remove our liberties. Now they could exact their revenge for our ability to avoid capture by flashing those strobe like red lights to pull us over on a minor violation accomplishing two things. First they knew that it sent a surge of paranoia through our circulatory systems causing discomfort, perhaps even incontinence. That’s the primal response I was speaking of earlier. Secondly, a pull over and the badge equipped them with everything they needed to search our cars to find out where we kept our hash pipes or hidden stashes, because they knew we were still prolifically puffing the perverse pot of decadence. With any luck they would then have the opportunity to use the Miranda right speech they had committed to memory for real. The bust of the neighborhood, a few more hardened (well stoned anyway) criminals locked away making society safe to continue forcing its backward values on their youths.
So now, even when I’ve reached the age where high school students read about our antics of demonstrating while high on the woeful weed in their history classes I still stiffen in paranoia when a cops lights flash in my mirror. That’s living proof of evolution right there, my brain has adapted to the fear of danger caused by flashing red lights just as our ancestors developed the fight or flight response from being chased by ferocious human devouring animals. My children probably have this red light fear gene embedded in their DNA already. Or maybe its just a stoner reaction. If that’s the case I wonder is if this paranoid phenomenon will ever cease. Will I ever be able to drive normally when a cop is behind me? Am I destined to peering behind my wheelchair in the old folks home if a light flickers while rolling to early bird dinner?
I get that the institution of policing is important, ever since I reached the point I understood I really never was invincible I understood that believing in anarchy is a part of teen angst coming of age, but like I said, I obey laws. For the most part anyway, and the few laws I may bend are hardly worth punishing because I obviously will never learn and will never consider my minor indiscretions to be evil or wrong. But seriously guys, there must be a way to break this cycle of fear every time I see a cop.
PEACE

Cuz I only Have Pies, For You

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only pies

Is the dough out tonight?
I don’t know if I rolled it out right
But I ONLY HAVE PIES
Foooooor You

Ah yes, holidays are here and its time to get pie baking. Apple pies, mincemeat pies (which is what my Mom once threatened to make out of me), cream pie, chicken pot pie. Wait, what? Is that a three course meal, chicken…pot…and pie? Or is there a reason they call them pot pies? It begs the question, is it possible to use the same rolling technique I learned as a teen to roll out my pie dough? Perhaps. I remember the first time I learned to roll my own back in the day, so maybe it’s like riding a bike and one never forgets. In fact I believe if I had some rolling papers and something to roll in them this second I would till be able to create the perfect fatty. (Do I mean hypothetically? Perhaps)The real question is this, can I use that same long ago learned skill to make my pies for the holidays? Well The Existential Baker has never been one to give up without giving it the old culinary college try, so lets investigate. Nothing to lose anyway, if it doesn’t work I will just fall back to the old school daze of rolling when I was on the honor roll of joint rolling and set myself up with a good old fashioned doob. (definitely not hypothetic)
First I want to investigate the commonalities of smoking herb and baking. Here we go. Cakes are like the baggies of herb in weed world. A half ounce is like a six inch cake, a lid (very old term for between a half and an ounce) is an eight inch cake, and the five finger ounce is a huge ten inch cake. Quarter pound is a half sheet, and well you get the picture. The higher the quality the higher the cost. You can get a cheap store bought pre made cake for the price of Mexican green weed, a home-style bakery fresh cake for the price of Acapulco gold pot, or a custom made baked to order cake in the shape of just about anything which is like a purchase of killer Thai Stick. All of them taste great and make you feel good but the Thai Stick is by far the most enjoyable and impressive of highs. I specialize in cupcakes, which is more like smoking from a bowl of a multiple hose hookah pipe.
Picture this, a giant mushroom, a tie dye colored humongous caterpillar sitting on top of it smoking from a hookah pipe. He offers you a hit and you smile like a Cheshire cat. Either you’re referencing Alice in Wonderland or your doing hallucinogens not weed. Ease up on your THC levels. But back to the hookah. The multiple hose hookah he offers you is a pipe designed to offer a smooth smoke for multiple users, more than likely a must have in the good old opium dens where Eastern Mystics went to light up and chillax. That’s kinda what happens with the cupcakes, you sit around a table and everyone is empowered to enjoy whatever flavor they chose, unlike the basic chocolate layer cake which needs to be cut and portioned. And everyone get the same buzz. (From chocolate) With cupcakes the user, or eater, just picks whichever one they want and its all ready for them, in a nice neat self contained package. I also make bite size mini’s, which is like a set of one-hitters. Anyway, around the table you sit with the cupcake of your choice and you can use a fork or just stuff the dynamic flavored treat directly into your mouth. By using the best and freshest ingredients we bake our little treats then offer them up for consumption. Cupcakes may also be used for medicinal purposes, having properties which help combat depression and other mood related afflictions. No prescription is needed, just an okay from Web-MD or a simple self-diagnosis will do. But please use in moderation, cupcake withdrawal can be a bitch. That’s how a warped mind like The EB views his cupcake creations, like high grade pleasure inducing treats made individually for each one to indulge as they choose. We create preamo organic mind teasers and palate pleasers for your recreational or medicinal enjoyment. (for private parties I have been known to enhance them with ……. Lets just say more organics). But I’m off on a tangent which happens often when the mind is distracted by weed, I mean cupcakes, so back to rolling.
Back in the day the rolling papers were too small to make a proper fatty. We had to get resourceful sticking two papers together. The same concept applies with pies. Two separate discs of rolled dough for a fatty of a pie. Its important to get the dough to the proper thickness and size for the desired result. Once rolled its time to put the product inside. Lets say its some high quality sliced Washington State G-Mama Smith apples cut with some sugar and spices. Too much filling will rip the paper, so proportion is important but you want that mother stuffed to the max with a nice mountain of sweet surrender. Oh to live on, Sugar Mountain! Now we need to stick the two shells together. I’m not going to lick the pie dough because….well gross, so in place of my saliva I will use some whipped eggs and brush the edges gently just as I would have licked the glue. Using a rolling pin replaces the art of holding your product between index fingers and thumbs to roll it up. You won’t need that to roll out the dough but remember that skill because it will come in handy when you need to pick it up and place it on top of the apple mountain. Roll the dough in a circle a tad bigger than what you need then fold it in half. (use plenty of the white powdery stuff to prevent sticking) Then using thumbs and index fingers pick it up and place it on top of the apples with the crease across the middle. Use the aforementioned pinch method and flip it over the apple creating a pleasuredome. Gently press along the edges to seal, cut off the excess dough and crimp for a perfect fatty of an apple pie. Now its time to bake. Matter of fact, let’s put it in the oven and we’ll all get baked!
This may be a bit of a stretch, but when you get down to it many of the skills I acquired back in the days have come in handy working in kitchens. Cutting and portioning with a spatula or knife instead of a credit card, sifting flour at an angle just like cleaning weed on an album cover, or rolling dough the way we rolled joints. So when you get down to it, my youth was clearly not misspent, and I received a valuable education at school outside of the classrooms……PEACE

Like us on Facebook at Jarets Stuffed Cupcakes, or visit our website….http://www.stuffedcupcakes.com/

Camp Stoned-Henge

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cheech-and-chong

Fresh shipment of skunk weed just hit town and I rolled the mothah of all joints. I fired that bad boy up, filled my lungs to capacity and passed it to Mario. Its been dry for almost two months now with nothing around. No red or gold grass, no Jamaican Ganja, no hashish, no Canibinol, not even any shit Mexican dirt weed. We’d resorted to puffing seeds and stems or the occasional resonated tar like lump of whatever the hell we were able to scrape out of our pipes. The first real hit in weeks and its some of the finest wacky tobacky skunk weed we around. Skunk weed, as its name implies, stinks like shit. Not shit exactly, closer to its namesake skunk, but either way when you stick your nose in the baggie it stinks of ass. But the smoke tastes sweet as could be and more importantly this shit FUCKS YOU UP!! The marijuana drought of 72 was now officially over so we were puffing our stone free asses off. “Oh my gawd JT, this shit is kickin’ my ass” Mario exhaled as he was exclaiming what we all were thinking after only one hit. When my turn came around for seconds I inhaled even deeper and held it as long as I could until my lungs waved the white flag and I surrendered a cough agreeing whole heartedly. “You ain’t shitting pickles my man, this is some killer ass weed. I am so stoned! I just wish Jimbo D was here to share it with us.” Jimbo D was a good friend and the fourth musketeer of our gang who moved up to the Catskills. He dropped out of school because his girlfriend was pregnant. They opted to move to Monticello to work for Jimbo’s uncle so now it was just me, Mario, and Shadow hanging around town struggling to finish school. Out of nowhere Shadow blurted out “Hey, my old man has a four man tent.”
The three of us broke out laughing wildly each holding our sides as if they may actually split and continued until we realized none of us knew what was funny. Shadow recovered first, “Haha, what in the hell are we laughing at?” I composed myself a little and looked back at Shadow to answer. “I think it was you Shadow, something about your old man pitching tents in his bedroom.” Shadow laughed again but Mario scratched his head in confusion, “Pitching tents? No he said his Dad has tents, like four of them.” At that point I understood how stoned we were as our conversations were lacking any semblance of lucidity but I needed to know what Shadow meant. “You say you have a four person tent? What did you have in mind?” Shadow exhaled another cloud of sweet second hand smoke, “Well, maybe we could drive up to Monticello to visit Jimbo and Debs and camp out in a tent. That way it’ll just cost us money for food, beer, and weed. We can split the cost of gas.” Amazingly sound proposition from someone so buzzed, and it was almost instantly that all three agreed. A plan began incubating.
That gave us three days to gather together as much drugs and money we could rustle up on short notice and get out of work or whatever else we needed to do. Shadow said he’d call in sick, Mario didn’t work, and this is my weekend off so it was perfect. We chose to leave early Friday afternoon so we would still have enough light to set up the tent. Shadow researched and found a state owned campground just about fifteen minutes from Monticello where we could campout for free. So off to the upstate New York town of Sundown we go.
“Checklist guys. I got a half ounce of weed, a full tank, and a cooler waiting to fill up with beer before we split.” I looked over at Shadow who was supplying the tent, “I got the tent, a coulpa sleeping bags, and a gas lantern. Plus a hatchet and Swiss army knife.” Shadow had a smug proud smile because like most times it was he that thought of the practical shit. Like some kind of real boyscout or something. We both looked at Mario not expecting anything but he shocked the shit out of us. “Well, I got a little cash here, and I also managed to score 6 hits of Bounty Acid.” He held out his hand and in it was a ripped up sheet of what looked like a stained paper towel. Shadow and I let out a simultaneous “Bounty Acid?” Mario chuckled, “its some clinical LSD dripped on paper towels, kinda like the new sugar cube LSD. I got it from my brother and he swears it’s some really good shit man. He’s never let us down before right? When we find Jimbo and Debs we can all trip our asses off.” Me and Shadow exchanged elated approvals. Our weekend was gonna rock and roll.
Monticello was only three hours away in normal traffic but it was Friday afternoon so it took us over an hour just to get on the Throggs Neck Bridge. But once we got through the Bronx it was clear sailing and we located our free campground area just around eight. We surveyed our temporary home, a mountainous forest with a few large clearings and an ice cold stream. We figured out what a preserve is. An isolated place in the woods with no bathroom, no shower, not much of anything but that running ice cold communal stream and a lot of wildlife. Not like Lions and Tigers and Bears and shit, but woodchucks, raccoons, possums, beavers, and foxes. Not the beavers and foxes we were hoping for, real ones. WTF, at least we may find out how much wood a woodchuck can chuck. No matter, its free, we are always open for an adventure, and we had lots of shit for our heads so we worked together and got the tent set up.
Shadow was beaming with pride over our accomplishment and I gotta say the tent looked professional. I stated happily, “All the comforts of home.” Mario was not as enthusiastic not being much of an outdoorsy kinda dude, “Yea ‘cept television a kitchen and a place to shit in peace. JT, light up a joint will ya?” I reached into my cigarette package for the ready to puff fat doob and struck it up, “Capital idea my most awesome brother, lets commence to getting stoned.” Before the joint even reached its destiny of being fastened to a roachclip I lit a second one and Shadow got us each a cold Pabst Blue Ribbon. Now we were feeling good and buzzed and not caring about the lack of amenities in our camp, which we baptized as “Camp Stoned-henge”
Time to begin our search for Jimbo. We had an address, no idea what part of Monticello it was, but being naïve young stoners we believed if we drove around town we would eventually find the street, surprise Jimbo and Deb with some weed, LSD, and beer an have a big ole party. That was the plan anyway. Mario was by far the best driver especially when we were all stoned so I handed him the keys to my little red Simca “La Bomba”. “Okay Mario, the coolers is packed, I rolled eight doobs, and you got the acid. Here’s the keys bro, take us away.” With that the three of us headed out into the higher regions of the Catskill Mountains smoking joints and having fun. We laughed and drove and drove and laughed and we all three were in a great mood. The sun had just gone down to what they call sunset, but sunset way up in the mountains can be very different, and with the thick fog settling in it was more like horror movie cliché at dusk. It was nearly impossible to see but fortunately not many other cars were out on this foggy eve. Then we hit the road that would alter the complexion of our trip in ways we could never have foreseen. Twist Run Mountain Road. The road was long, with many a winding turn, that leads us to who knows where. Mario was doing his best to negotiate the twists and turns but between the fog in the mountain and the fog in his stoned out head his driving was far more erratic than normal. More than once he crossed or straddled the double yellow line and we couldn’t see more than ten feet in front of us. We kept moving, but at the speed of an old man in a wheelchair. We prayed we would not be noticed.
Prayers are funny things. Sometime they are answered, and sometimes they act like they are intercepted by the Karma police. None of us were very religious so instead of being answered they became some kind of karmic retribution, some sort payback for being evil Long Island suburban kids smoking devils weed. With the bright white headlights being refracted in the fog it was easy to see the contrasting rays of red strobe like lights which bounced off of everything. “Oh fuck man, I’m getting pulled over.“ Paranoia can make you freeze or give you paranormal quickness of thought. My panic first kicked in frozen as vision of an upstate New York prison until intuition filled my brain. Paranormal quickness took center stage as I immediately pulled the remaining joints out of my cigarette box and handed each of the boys two, leaving me with two. “Quick Mario, take out the cid an toss it out the window.” As Mario grabbed them from his pocket the always frugal and efficient Shadow pulled them from his hand and yelled “No wait, lets eat the acid first then the joints. We don’t wanna get busted tossing shit out of the window way the fuck up here. Besides Mario spent good money on it, hate to waste that.” At the time it seemed like a great idea. Mario stalled by pulling over slowly and we each ate two hits of LSD then began chewing the pot. Funny thing about skunk weed, and a fact I had previously been unaware of is it not only smells like skunk ass, it tastes like skunk ass too. Not to say I have eaten skunk ass before, but using my imagination that’s what it would taste like. I chewed and swallowed my two rodent shit tasting big bamboo sticks, Shadow ate his two, but Mario could only finish one. “Hey man, I can’t get this down it tastes horrible. JT, ya gotta take it man.” I grabbed the stick shoved it in my mouth and began chewing just as the cop came up to the window shining his flashlight on us. “Whatcha boyz a dewn up here, eh?“ He shined the light around our eyes and I stopped chewing, allowing the skunk ass flavor to proliferate around my cheeks awhile. Mario took control. “Um, sorry officer, we, uh we’re like here looking for our friend who lives up here in Monticello and like we got like lost in the mountains, he he, and well like the fog is like I mean like I can‘t like even see” Suddenly realizing he told a cop he couldn‘t see yet was still driving Mario made an attempt at a save and blurted, “I mean not like CAN“T see, but like not like really well, I mean this fog is like I mean can’t.. How do you do it officer?” The cop began searching our faces using his flashlight like a spotlight while I frantically tried to swallow inconspicuously the last of the skunk weed and rolling paper. He looked directly at me and suddenly that was me in the spot-light, nearly losing my biological functions. “Y’all looking fer a friend ya say? In Monticello? Well you boys’r in Ellenville now. I think maybe Y’all aughtta step on out the car.” He stepped back and shone his light on Mario and I took the opportunity to swallow the last of the wad of pastey skunk ass saliva soaked crap in my mouth. I was sure my breath stunk like a skunks ass and that’s something I wouldn’t want to try and explain to a hick cop way up in the Catskill Mountains. I wished I has a mint or something but at least we had no drugs to get busted with now. The cop frisked each of us then made us open the trunk of the car. Inside we had a cooler and my Moms wicker picnic basket. The lawman focused on the basket and said, “That’s a helluva nice basket there boys. My wife sure’d like something like that.” I said nothing, but Shadow was quick on the draw. He picked it up and handed it to the cop, “Well officer, why don’t you take this back to the Mrs. We’d be honored if you would take this as a token of our appreciation for helping us figure out where we are and how we can get back home.” Between Shadows charm and my Moms basket the cop took the bribe, smiled and said, “Well thank you boys, that sure is awful nice. My wife is gonna be right happy tonight. Now why don’t y’all get on back in your car, don’t move for about one hour an let the fog settle down. Make sure y’all go straight to where your staying” I looked at Shadow then at Mario and thought about how pissed my Mom was gonna be when she finds out I, or rather Shadow gave away her wicker basket. Anyway the cop was leaving, both Shadow and I mumbled good bye but Mario thought he would add to our new found friendly relation with the officer. With his goofiest big smile he added “We call it Camp Stoned-henge” The cop stopped glared in our direction and paused for a brief moment, then just shook his head as put his prize in his car. “You boys just get on back to your camp whatever, I sure don’t wanna run into y’all again tonight. Unnerstand?” No answer was necessary, we got into La Bomba, waited until the cop was out of sight and split.
Now there was some considerable silence in the car, each of us processing what just happened, and wondering what two hits of acid was gonna be like once it kicked in. Mario was driving and spoke first, “Lets just do like he said and head back to camp. Maybe tomorrow in the light we can find Jimbo.” As obvious and sensible as that was I still wanted to talk about my Moms basket, “Man, why the fuck did you give him My Moms basket? She’s gonna fucking kill me!” Shadow was already prepared with his answer, “Dude chill! It got us out of trouble, what if he kept us there and we all started tripping? We’ll chip in and get a new one, just tell her you left it somewhere.” Satisfied but not happy I had to agree, and off we drove back to Camp Stoned-henge in relative quiet.
No sooner did we get back to our tent did the tingling feeling of an oncoming LSD trip began. We popped open some brews, and waited. I don’t think I ever hallucinated so much before. I was seeing animals that weren’t there, probably not seeing animals that were, and we laughed for about three hours straight all the time having no idea whatsoever why we were laughing. Trees grew extra branches then bent over and kissed the ground. The sounds of the wilderness were symphonic, and even in the dark the colors were magnificent. Time seemed suspended and life looked distorted as if through a kaleidoscope tube but it was okay, even humorous for some bizarre reason. The acid changed the complexion of the evening and we had a blast.
We knew we were never gonna find Jimbo and Debs now, but we were high as shit, tripping and laughing away. We got lost in a mountain fog, had to eat almost all of our weekend supply of drugs including two hits each of acid, got pulled over by a corrupt hick cop almost getting busted, gave away my Moms wicker basket, but at least we’re safe, and happily tripping. Would be for at least the next 5 or 6 hours. We were laughing uncontrollably, happy as clams and the worst was over. Then something fell on the top our temporary canvas abode. Maybe a small twig or something. Then another, and another. Shadow peeked through the tent opening and gave us the news, “Oh oh, looks like rain guys” As the words began to sink in the rat a tat tat on the tent picked up speed and decibels. Within seconds the light rain morphed into a mountain downpour and I felt the earth move under my feet-I felt the sky a tumbling. Before we knew what happened we had wall to wall mud carpeting. Mario began freaking out, I began laughing harder, and Shadow stared out to tent opening and with a prophecy told us the wind was kicking up which reminded him of a time he and his Dad were camping, got caught in a storm so bad that the wind yanked the tent spikes out and one stuck in his leg.
The last lucid memory I had was Shadow showing us this little scar on his calf. Less lucid is a memory as vague as the mud carpet, of three tripped out stoners laughing with a mixture of delight and horror as we became part of a canvas blob of a soaking wet mudpack. We managed to pop our heads out of the openings, Mario found some cans of mud crusted PBR’s and we partied until well after sunrise. At some point we finally fell asleep.
We slept clear through to Sunday morning and when the Sunday morning sun menacingly shook us awake we looked like burnt and crusted Woodstock wash outs, completely covered in dried mud and probably woodchuck piss. We rummaged through what was left of our campsite, the weed was MIA, the cooler had tipped over but still had a few warm beers in it, and the sleeping bags and everything else including the tent were a damp collaboration of musty half dried shit. We tossed it all in the trunk where my Moms wicker basket once resided, went down and bathed in the ice cold stream. We set out home to Long Island and despite having a ton and a half of fun each vowed to never return to Camp Stoned-henge…..PEACE